1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a braiding apparatus and method which are simple yet highly effective and which have numerous advantages including the ability to be used to gather and separate a person's hair into a series of discrete bundles useful for making braids, particularly French braids, and to thereafter maintain the bundle configuration in the hair while the braid is being made. More particularly, the invention is concerned with a pair of arcuately shaped, pivotally and releasably interconnected clips having oppositely facing comb structures configured to form the series of bundle forming slots when the comb structures are brought into registration with one another after moving the clips toward one another through the hair.
2. Description of the Prior Art
When making a French braid in a person's hair which has a pleasing appearance, problems are encountered because the braiding process involves multiple complicated steps, some of which must be performed in unison. For example, the process of making a French braid involves the gathering, separating and the holding of the hair into two distinct portions. The first portion is a part of the hair which is drawn relatively tight from the sides of the head toward a medial line extending from crest to brow. The second portion is a part of the hair which has been gathered at, and which hangs loosely, from the medial line. It is the second portion into which the French braid will be made. The process, however, requires that the second loose portion be further separated into a series of discrete bundles extending in series generally along the medial line. During the process, each bundle must yet be further separated into strands, typically left, center and right strands. The strand separation process procedes in serial order through the bundles beginning with an initial bundle and ending with a final bundle in the bundle series. The French braid is made in the strands in the conventional way by repeatedly crossing a left and then a right strand over a central strand. Immediately preceeding the crossing of the strands, however, left and right strands are combined with associated left and right strands from the next adjacent bundle, this process being repeated in serial order until the hair in each bundle has been woven into a braid.
As can be appreciated, the process of gathering, separating and holding the hair as described above requires a high level of skill and manual dexterity, and if not performed in a precise fashion, will result in a braid which is loose, non-uniform and generally unsightly. Further, the process is time consuming and if a person needs to remove their hands from the hair while making the French braid, the hair portions can quickly unravel, become slack, or otherwise lose the intended orientation.